“Part of people’s obsession with Milo is that no one can work out how much of him is real and how much is persona,” agrees Jack Rivlin, founder and CEO of The Tab, who used to share an office with Yiannopoulos in Clerkenwell. “In person he is kind and generous, and ridiculously good fun, even for people who expect to be one of his ‘enemies’. A lot of people who hate his public persona would attend his funeral and be genuinely sad, which probably explains the Milo paradox quite well.”

Yiannopoulos is the alt-Right poster boy who delights in riling the sensible and liberal with incendiary statements and provocative stunts. Last month, he immersed himself in a bath of pig’s blood for a performance piece called Angel Mom, part of a pro-Trump art show in New York. He wore a baseball cap reading “Make America Great Again”.

He is contemptuous of women and minorities, he once shared a Twitter poll inviting followers to answer the question, “which would you rather your child had: feminism or cancer?”. As a gay man he is scathing of certain elements of UK gay culture, surprising and offending many in the community. Is being homosexual wrong, he has asked. “Something somewhere inside of me says yes.” Critics point to this as an example of pathological self-hatred. In July he was permanently banned by Twitter, and as a result, he is hailed as a martyr by a certain coterie of young, white, angry men offended by liberal sensibilities.

"A man is rich when he has time and freewill. How he chooses to invest both will determine the return on his investment."

He's purposely confusing against his intellectually dishonest debating opponents. He mixes trolling and satire with sincere arguments in order to confound them, inject humor and reveal their control freakishness and ridiculous insistence on labeling everyone they disagree with as racists, misogynists, white supremacists, etc.

I think this quote from Riviln is misleading:

Jack Rivlin wrote:"He is contemptuous of women and minorities, he once shared a Twitter poll inviting followers to answer the question, 'which would you rather your child had: feminism or cancer?'"

He specifically defined his satirical question toward 3rd wave feminism and gives examples of its "cancerousness", and also says he is in favor of 2nd wave feminism, which he claims has long since succeeded in guaranteeing women equal opportunity in countries like England and the US. So the twitter poll about feminism and cancer does not indicate at all that he is contemptuous of women and minorities, but it could easily be taken that way for a variety of innocent reasons, as well as used against him by his detractors.

Jack Rivlin wrote: In July he was permanently banned by Twitter, and as a result, he is hailed as a martyr by a certain coterie of young, white, angry men offended by liberal sensibilities.

Are young, white, angry men part of his fan base? Maybe, but I think people who should not be characterized as angry, but are pro free speech are the much larger part.

I find this defense of Milo a bit baffling. He is a gay Catholic, so of course there is some amount of self-loathing. And calling his detractors or opponents (or whatever) dishonest in their debates is just strange. If he is what you say he is, then he is purposefully dishonest about his entire schtick.

In his press conference, he admits in his own words that what he said was wrong and he even apologized. Yeah, there was a lot of equivocation and making himself out to be a martyr, but he plainly said he regretted what he said and that it was wrong. I wonder if we will ever get that out of the Liar in Cheif. Probably not.

This whole free speech thing is bogus. He could have talked at UCD, but decided not to. Although he did come back to my hometown the next day to reenact the notorious act of police brutality by Officer Pike and others. Same for Berkeley, from what I understand--he chickened out. Who are the real snowflakes?

Also, this seems to tie in with your equally strange defense of Trump. As I said before, there is no need to exaggerate: we only need listen to what the guy says. Well, and watch what he does. His lack of experience, temper tantrums, and vendettas are already sullying the office beyond the normal dirt of politics.

Milo can say what he wants, but people can then say what they want back to him. And, no one has a Right to be published or use private services.

Yep, he's confusing, and only a mind reader would know whether his confusion is deliberate. Could say the same about DJT. However, people are fine with free speech, except when it comes to particular religions. Btw, I respect Milo as much as I do Alex J., but I don't think about them at all. And, I really don't care if someone is called a racist, misogynist, etc., or a white supremacist. Those are specific social and ideological positions on specific issues. It's not like calling someone "the n-word."

Well, I've got nothing against free speech, and people here say some of the same things that he [Milo] does --not about pedophilia ... yet. I just remember a guy named Jeremiah Wright and how even listening to him was damning.

Anyway, Mike, did you follow Milo before this because of his views?

Last edited by Steve James on Tue Feb 21, 2017 9:37 pm, edited 1 time in total.

"A man is rich when he has time and freewill. How he chooses to invest both will determine the return on his investment."

For ex., though, some people condemn Islam because (they say) girls are married at 12. Oh, the scandal. Yet, it happens in the U.S. today; and, Milo himself argued that a 13 year old could consent to sexual relations. Since I have a 15 year old daughter, I cringe at the thought. Otoh, I recognize (not accept) that it's a social custom that can be frowned upon but doesn't necessarily make the practitioners evil. It's about what really determines consent as opposed to coercion.

Anyway, I can argue with Milo on this point and not be a regressive leftist. And, someone else could argue that 10 years old is old enough. Personally, I'd rather worry about guys like those than bathroom accommodations.

"A man is rich when he has time and freewill. How he chooses to invest both will determine the return on his investment."

I've watched some of his videos during the past 2 months or so and I do find his debating opponents that I've seen to be dishonest control freaks, so that's what the defense is about. I had not watched any of the videos that led to his resignation from Breitbart and loss of book deal until just now, until this one, which is almost 22 minutes:

In regards to his comments about sexual relations with minors, I am not attempting to make any defense. He said he was wrong and apologized.

Ian, there is not much comparison between Milo and Trump. Let's talk about Trump on those threads unless there is a clear connection. However, yeah, I agree with you about this, "As I said before, there is no need to exaggerate: we only need listen to what the guy says. Well, and watch what he does." One of the reasons I became aware of Milo or take more of an interest in Trump is because of outrageous exaggerations and lies that are totally unnecessary and polarizing.

Ian wrote:Same for Berkeley, from what I understand--he chickened out. Who are the real snowflakes?

At Berkeley, a mob of 200 totally black clad hooligans were rioting, smashing windows, ATMs, a vehicle, and were caught on video beating one girl with a flagpole into the ground and pepper spraying another in the face while she was giving an interview. There were multiple fires during all of this on campus and the police took little action against the criminals, finally arresting one person. For you to say that Milo chickened out and suggest he is a snowflake is, uhm, baffling.

The violence at Berkeley that succeeded in preventing free speech does motivate me to some extent to be more receptive to hearing Milo's message and be defensive of him where there is a clear case for it.

Here is a recent video with Milo on Bill Maher where Maher criticizes Milo for this schtick that he does where he himself is using it to provoke his opponents and make conversation pretty much impossible.

I think that creating terms like 2nd and 3rd wave feminism just makes issues vague. Talk about specifics and then the discussion is worth taking seriously. Should "all" people have "equal" rights? Where do those rights come from? If someone wants to argue against those principles, and that "some" people don't have the same rights, that's a different thing.

In the 90s, a speaker named Khalid Muhammad (sp?) was invited to speak at Columbia U. You can look him up, I guess. He was a young radical member of the "Black Muslims," who had their own perceptions about the source of America's and the world's problems. Suffice it to say that he did not agree with Malcolm's later views. Anyway, there were debates about bringing him in because he had voiced views that were considered anti-Semitic. (I use the term carefully because, like racism and misogyny, those who are called such often deny that there is such a thing). Was his "free speech" impeded? Nah. He can stand on the corner of 116th and B'way with a megaphone. (We did it just that way in the 70s. Our group just argued against the anti-Semites of whatever color). Anyway, ultimately, the college rescinded its invitation. Ok, looked it up http://spectatorarchive.library.columbi ... stone-----

"A man is rich when he has time and freewill. How he chooses to invest both will determine the return on his investment."

I know what you mean, I'm just quoting about the various waves of feminism. I don't even like acronyms, but some of the jargon associated with the extreme left is best encapsulated in their own labels because it don't make any sense and you can't even describe it without using more and more of their made up jargon.

It's okay to invite or not invite people to speak, and even to exclude people that you consider troublemakers if you have cause (a troublemaker is not a political opponent or someone with whom you disagree), but if the school has allowed someone to have a venue, I think to simply prevent them going ahead with the talk with a riot is out of bounds.

Some of those people say they're justified because they literally equate speech they disagree with to physical violence in a illogical jump that I outlined a few months ago on the Dr. Peterson video debates with the womens studies professors, who say there are no inherent biological differences between men and women that determine identity and to not refer to them in the 3rd person by the made up pronoun of their choice is the same as physical assault. That's on video. Some of those students protesting Milo's talk at UC Berkeley are just as nutty because they've learned from these profs.

Anyway Steve, now you seem to very permissive of people having their say, at least online. Have you adjusted your approach since the Khalid Muhammed incident?